An artist rendering of a new whiffle ball field and park planned for Cheney Stadium. Construction is expected to start in November. The park could be complete by April and will be open year-round. Tacoma RainiersCourtesy

An artist rendering of a new whiffle ball field and park planned for Cheney Stadium. Construction is expected to start in November. The park could be complete by April and will be open year-round. Tacoma RainiersCourtesy

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The Tacoma Rainiers announced Tuesday it is building a 9,670-square-foot park along the first base side of the stadium. The new park, located behind a grass berm, will include a playground for children and the whiffle ball field.

The facility, built in partnership with the Ben B. Cheney Foundation and Metro Parks Tacoma, will be open year-round.

Construction is expected to begin in November and finish in early April in time for the 2016 Rainiers season, Artman said. The park will be built by Tacoma’s Korsmo Construction.

The project is being funded by the team, the foundation and Metro Parks. Artman declined to say how much the park will cost.

“It’s the one area (of Cheney Stadium) that wasn’t really touched during the (2011) renovation,” Artman said. “I think it’s going to be really cool.”

The idea for the whiffle ball park came several years ago when Brad Cheney, president of the Cheney Foundation, attended a Seattle Mariners spring training game in Arizona. He noticed his sons where spending more time playing on a small family baseball field than watching the game.

We want it to live and breathe like a regular park.

Aaron Artman, Tacoma Rainiers president

He also liked the small playground at Seattle’s Safeco Field.

“I hope it will be good family entertainment before games,” Cheney said.

And even during games when, as Artman said, “the kids need to get the crazies out.”

It’s not an entirely new idea to baseball, however. The San Diego Padres’ Petco Park has a whiffle ball diamond at its centerfield “Park at the Park.” The park is also open when the Padres aren’t playing.

The Rainiers released artist renderings of the park this week. It park will include play equipment for children 2 to 5 years old and climbing structures for children 5 to 12.

“I think the playground might be the biggest piece of this,” Cheney said. “It gives young kids something to do when they aren’t watching the game.”

While 55-year-old Cheney Stadium is known for its iconic center field wall, rarely cleared by even the most powerful hitters, the whiffle ball diamond doesn’t emulate the original field.

“We had that idea,” Artman said of making the whiffle ball field a scale replica of the stadium.

The space and the budget will determine whether that’s possible, he said.

“We still might go that direction,” Artman said. “Right now, they (artist renderings) just show what we know we can do.”